When We Were Real
A Novel
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From multiple award-winning author Daryl Gregory comes a madcap adventure following two friends on a cross-country bus tour through the mind-boggling glitches in their simulated world as they grapple with love, family, secrets, and the very nature of reality in a simulation.
JP and Dulin have been the best of friends for decades. When JP finds out his cancer has aggressively returned, Dulin decides it's the perfect time for one last adventure: a week-long bus tour of North America's Impossibles, the physics-defying glitches and geographic miracles that started cropping up seven years earlier--right after the Announcement that revealed our world to be merely a digital simulacrum. The outing, courtesy of Canterbury Trails Tours, promises the trip of a (not completely real) lifetime in a (not completely deluxe) coach.
Their fellow passengers are 21st-century pilgrims, each of them on the tour for their own reasons. There's a nun hunting for an absent God, a pregnant influencer determined to make her child too famous to be deleted, a crew of horny octogenarians living each day like it's their last, and a professor on the run from leather-clad sociopaths who take The Matrix as scripture. Each stop on this trip is stranger than the last--a Tunnel outside of time, a zero gravity Geyser, the compound of motivational-speaking avatar--with everyone barreling toward the tour's iconic final stop Ghost City, where unbeknownst to our travelers the answer to who is running the simulation may await.
When We Were Real is a tour-de-force and exploration of what really matters, even in an artificial world.
About this Author
Daryl Gregory is the award-winning author of numerous novels, including Revelator, Afterparty, and Spoonbenders, a Nebula, Locus, and World Fantasy Award finalist. His novella We Are All Completely Fine won the World Fantasy Award and the Shirley Jackson Award. He currently resides in Seattle, Washington.
Reviews
"Road movie, group cast, all charming. Starts funny and stays that way, even after they fly off a cliff and crash hard into existential angst caused by severe ontological challenges. The soulfulness is hilarious, and vice versa (very important). Is this our America right now, seen with cosmic x-ray vision? Is it a Daryl Gregory novel? Same thing."--Kim Stanley Robinson, author of the Hugo, Nebula, and Locus award winning Mars trilogy
"An addictive thriller packed with winning characters and big, brilliant ideas. Don't miss it."--Lev Grossman, New York Times bestselling author of The Bright Sword and The Magicians trilogy
"Daryl Gregory takes a classic "what if?" thought experiment--the same one that undergirds The Matrix and other high-concept sci-fi extravaganzas--and treats it with groundedness, nuance and literary sophistication. The result is a deeply absorbing novel of cross-country adventure about real, recognizable people...the irony being that they're not real people at all. What absolute fun."--Ben H. Winters, Edgar-award winning author of The Last Policeman Trilogy
"When We Were Real goes far beyond the usual SF novels of living in a simulation. Its poignant, appealing, boisterous characters know they are simulations, and as they get on with their complicated digital lives, they--and we--explore what it means to be real, to be human, to be alive. A must-read by one of science fiction's most versatile and talented authors."--Nancy Kress, winner of six Nebulas, two Hugos, a Sturgeon, and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award
"A novel filled with characters so heartfelt and true to life that you forget they are products of a simulation... even if they can't. When We Were Real sets a new gold standard for big-idea science fiction."--Jack Skillingstead, author of The Chaos Function
"The best thing Daryl Gregory has ever written. A riveting page-turner that delves into the biggest questions of the universe and still tackles the mysteries of the human heart."--Christopher Farnsworth, author of Flashmob and Buried Secrets
"Daryl Gregory dispatches a captivating cast of characters on a pilgrimage through a vivid landscape, and you keep turning the pages to see where they'll go. He's managed a remarkable feat--When We Were Real is spirited, fun to read, with plenty of dark humor, yet asks big existential questions that keep you thinking long after you've finished the book."--Mark Tompkins, author of The Last Days of Magic
"[A] deeply philosophical road trip novel... Gregory bats the existential issues back and forth, offering no easy answers... The result is a heady and entertaining treat."--Publishers Weekly
"This novel is a fine accomplishment for Gregory-- an intellectual, enriching and emotionally resonant read."--BookPage
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